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Jackie's Journal (Final Excerpt)
(Week 12, GM: Mostly Phil, Player: James Beech, Hunters: Yes) I arrive at the bar five minutes late because the traffic getting out of Las Vegas is a nightmare. The man I've come looking for is already there, sitting out on the deck with a drink in his hand and his eyes on the sea. On the table next to him sits a leaf-shaped piece of obsidian, as big as my palm. There are numbers painted on it in white, much chipped and faded. 8,500. I pull an identical shard out of my shirt pocket as I draw level with the man and hold it up like a badge. He responds in kind. "Arcadia," he intones. The word is heavier than the stone. "Arcadia," I reply. "You human?" the man asks, peering at me quizzically. The hairs he has left are white, wispy, and badly outnumber by liver spots. I nod. "My name's Elia Harper." The man frowns. "You look too young to have been there." "Oh," I say comprehension dawning. I glance down at the shard and back up at the old man. "No, this was my mother's." The man nods. "That was a dark day. Your mother ever talk about it?" "Not much," I admit. "Sometimes when my godparents were over and they'd had a bit of wine, they'd start, you know, reminiscing. Especially if it was near the anniversary." The man brings out his phone--flip phones are back in fashion for some unknowable reason--and, squinting, presses a few buttons until the little holo-display shows an image of a microphone. "Would you like to tell me what they said about it?" the man asks, placing the phone on the table between us. "Like I said online, I'm making a kind of oral history. Because..." He gestures vaguely, taking in his own lined and wrinkled face and then the world around us. The sun sparkles off the waves that roll over what, when this man was young, was called 'California'. I don't need to ask what he means. The ones who remember are getting old or, like my mother, are already gone. "I'd be glad to tell you what I can," I assure him. "But I also have this." I reach into my shoulder bag and bring out the battered and peeling notebook. Flakes of marbled black and white fall from the cover as I handle it. "She kept a journal," I explain, as I leaf through the yellowed pages until I find, near the back, the section that I'm looking for. I've left a blue sticky note for myself at the top of the page. On it I have written, "The Battle of Arcadia." The old man peers interestedly at my mother's untidy handwriting and then glances back at the waiting phone. The little microphone image spins slowly around and around. "Would you read from it?" he asks. "Out loud, I mean. Would you read me what she wrote about the battle?" "Of course," I say, though it is not what I had expected. "Whenever you're ready." The man taps one more button and then looks up at me with an encouraging smile, his eyes expectant. I clear my throat, and begin. *** May 27th, 2016 Moscow, Idaho We all met under a huge tent set up by the 51st about a mile outside of town. It might have been near dawn, but with the sun obscured, it made little difference. There were more hunters than I'd ever seen, and not just hunters. Besides the soldiers, there were plenty of angels and faeries milling about. Harpies and ogres crouched on the perimeter and a couple of giants towered over the crowd. Suspiciously hairy men and women in bikers' leathers and tooth necklaces sat cheek by jowl with a pack of silver-furred wolves. A bat-eared goblin was carrying on an animated conversation with a Duke of Hell and a circle of hunched and wizened old men in the corner eyed us all as though we might be food. There were several maps on the big table in the middle of the tent with a dark circle marking the location of the gateway and crosses showing us where to find the ward stones. These were our job. We had to break all of them at once to bring down the magical shields that hung over Arcadia. Accordingly, we split into three groups. I went with Elliot, Tom, Luiz, Morgan, and Katarina. We hadn't gone more than a few yards though when Jasper caught up with us. Unsurprisingly, the excitable fox spirit hadn't been listening for his assignment. No one had the heart to forbid him tagging along. We piled into Tom's car, which was none too roomy. I ended up on Elliot's lap and it made me feel like a little kid. It was a nice feeling, almost, but not the kind of thing I wanted to feel just before we headed into battle. My stomach was a cold knot. Tom and Morgan laid spells on the car to conceal it and make it levitate. Our plan was to glide undetected over the minefield around the town's perimeter and then launch a surprise attack on the forces guarding our ward stone. Unfortunately, the jaguar beasts must have had some senses we hadn't accounted for. They spotted our advance in no time and came bounding out to meet us. Katarina called down a bolt of lighting from the storm clouds that were gathering thickly above us, detonating a mine directly under one of the beasts. It barely singed it. Still, the noise and the flash were quite alarming. I reached out to the minds of the lesser jaguars and found that alarm. I fed my own dread into it, the way you'd feed twigs into a fire, stoking it until it was full-blown terror. The smaller creatures turned tail and fled, but their huge leader came on undaunted. There was loud popping noise and suddenly there was a woman sitting on top of me, a hunter I'd never met. The sorcerers had warned us against trying to teleport too near the magical shields, but I guess someone had tried anyway. Poor Elliot was being crushed and the butt of the new hunter's sniper rifle was digging into my gut. The giant jaguar beast sprang, landing on the hood of the car with a terrible crunch. It ripped the roof open like you'd pop the tab on a can of soda. The new hunter fired the rifle right into the beast's mouth and for a moment I couldn't think about anything but the ringing in my ears. The jaguar seemed unharmed by the bullet and Jasper's obsidian knife couldn't even scratch it. The weight of the monster was driving the crumpled nose of the car down into the dirt of minefield. Katarina blasted it off with another surge of stormy power and Tom leapt out after it, his sword aflame. Unfortunately, the damage to the car had destroyed the glyphs that kept us hidden from human eyes and the two machine gun nests around the wardstone now opened fire. Morgan lashed out at one with her dark magic and Rollo took off snarling after the other one, while Elliot laid down covering fire. The guns stuttered and went silent. The car, now little more than a charred wreck carried on the wings of the storm, drifted on out of the minefield and came to rest near the wardstone. Luiz let off a red flare to let the other strike teams know that we were in position and Morgan began drawing a magic circle around the wardstone, which was protected by its own shimmering barrier. Jasper made himself insubstantial and ran out to Tom, then tried to teleport them both safely out of the minefield. There was another popping sound and both of them disappeared. Elliot gave me a stricken look, but before I could speak the ground began to rumble. Something dreadful burst from the earth. It was scaly and legless, but segmented, more like worm than a snake and its face, flattened and distorted though it was, was undoubtedly that of a great cat. It roared but Katarina, as coolly collected as ever, lofted her silver hammer and called down the storm. A barrage of ice crystals, long and sharp as spears with blue-white lightning crackling along their lengths, tore down from the heavens and ripped into the monster's flesh. Its dark blood spattered the churned earth and it fled back into the depths. We pulled back towards the wardstone and found Jasper in our midst again. In his fox form, Jasper moves like the wind. While Elliot bandaged my cuts and bruises, he told us that Tom was still alive, but had chosen to stay behind and help one of the other strikes teams that found itself badly outnumbered. I reached out and found the minds of the monsters they were fighting: more of the trollish jaguar creatures. Then I reached out and touched the great, slow mind of the jaguar-wyrm. I found its hunger and pointed it towards the lesser jaguar beasts. It began, happily, to devour them. Back in the here and now, Katarina had raised a wall of ice, charged with lightning and guarded by the winds, to defend our position. Unfortunately, it obscured our view and made a fair bit of noise, so we didn't notice the tank until it blasted a hole in the wall and began to shell us. I called on Rollo then. I'd promised Tom and Elliot that I wouldn't, but the shotgun Tom had loaned me was useless against an armored vehicle and we were pinned down. Rollo slipped through the reinforced steel as though it were a bead curtain. I felt the savage pleasure he took in killing the men inside, felt it as my own. I loved the crunch of their spines and the wet heat of their spurting blood. The tank stopped moving and its long gun ceased to menace. Another red flare went up. Two out of three. Then something reached out of the gloom of the eclipse-dark battlefield and seized Luiz, dragging him away. It was a dark tendril of fog, and though it fell away when he sliced it with his club-sword, another one at once replaced it. The fog had no mind that I could See, so I reasoned that it was a spell of some kind. Katarina and I scrambled to get the ingredients for a counter charm, but I had to break off to help Luiz. I could See the fog pressing on his mind, suffocating it, and his struggles were growing weaker. I reached out to his mind and shook it awake. He yelped and began to stir again. But now the fog was all around us, swirling about our ankles and slithering up over our skins. It felt strangely warm and not heavy at all, like being touched with a sunbeam. It had been so long since I had seen the sun... When I returned to my senses, Katarina was crouched on top of the lifeless tank, beyond the reach of the fog, which was now dissipating. She'd chalked a hasty circle on the scarred metal and she was shouting something at us. I looked about me wildly and saw that another wave of jaguar beasts was descending. We fought with desperate strength. I'm afraid I caught poor Luiz with the edge of my shotgun blast. The damn thing kicked like a mule, and well, I don't have that many pounds for it to push against. Jasper teleported one monster away from us. We didn't know where it had gone and didn't care. Morgan was just ripping the life from the last of them--she was swaying drunkenly from all the vital energy she had absorbed--when the third and final flare went up. I opened my mind, feeling for the other telepaths among the hunters. We coordinated as first the mages dropped the shields on the wardstones, then the heavy hitters smashed the stones themselves into glassy shards. The great shield trembled and fell. We ran flat out through the empty streets of Arcadia. All three strike forces converged on the portal, a huge mirror of black glass, decorated around its edge with symbols, like a Mesoamerican calendar wheel. Before it stood a tall man, his tawny skin dappled with kohl and pierced by countless ornaments of turquoise and beaten gold. He was flanked on either side by three jaguar beasts, the biggest we had yet seen, and by innumerable soldiers with guns and grenades, some little more than children. For a moment I hesitated, but then I caught sight of Tom. He was rushing the enemy lines, outpacing all others, his great white coat fanning out behind him like a pair of wings. In one hand he held his flaming sword, burning with a magnesium intensity. In the other, he carried an obsidian knife, so black it seemed to drink the light. Elliot uttered a wordless cry and took off after him. And, as always, I followed Elliot. We collided with the enemy, bowling over soldiers and slamming into the jaguar beasts like waves pounding against the dunes. I'd lost the shotgun back in the melee with jaguars, so now I called upon Rollo again. I called and he answered. A jaguar beast had just lifted Luiz aloft, refusing to die though his club-sword was sunk deep in the creature's brain. Rollo hit it like a juggernaut. The writhing tentacles of his mane curled about its head and shoulders, ripping with barbed suckers and stinging like an anemone. The black talons of a dozen legs tore into the beast's flesh and fangs like scimitars gouged deep. The jaguar thing flailed out blindly as it died. The mindless blow passed through Rollo's insubstantial skull. Pain stabbed at me and I squeezed my eyes shut as the psychic feedback began to take its toll. This time, I knew instinctively, it would be too much. I'd pushed my mind and body too far today. This time the pain, Rollo's pain, would kill me. And then it vanished. Not just the pain, but the whisper at the back of my mind that connected me to...no, that was, Rollo. Our bond was gone. Somehow he'd realized what was happening and he... My stomach gave a sickening lurch and my eyes flew open. I could see Rollo standing in front of me. Not See him, but actually see him entirely with my waking eyes. Dark blood dribbled from his open jaws and his scaly flanks heaved as he stared back at me. His eyes were emerald coals. I had no idea what to do but before I could do it, I felt a new voice in my mind, loud and urgent. It was one of the other telepaths among the hunters, warning me that Tom was sending Ezriel to take Elliot and I out of harm's way. I thrust the knowledge at Elliot. They cursed and bounded over to where Morgan stood catching her breath. Morgan nodded as Elliot explained the problem and then pressed her thumb to their forehead. For a moment, a glowing rune stood out against Elliot's skin. I knew what it was, a glyph to hide one from the Sight of angels. I wasn't sure whether I wanted one too. Such glyphs were permanent; they worked directly on the soul. I'd seen first hand the kind of damage putting strange magic into your soul could cause. As I wavered, biting my lip in thought, Ezriel appeared in brilliant flash. He seemed to stare right through Elliot, and then turned his burning gaze on me. He advanced wordlessly, his hand outstretched. Golden fire shimmered around his fingertips. I panicked and in my panic, I reached out instinctively for Rollo. If anything could save me from an angel, he could. I couldn't find him. His mind, always a beacon in my Sight, the fixed point I could navigate by, simply wasn't there. I staggered, as though I'd leaned my weight against a wall that turned out to be a mirage, and Ezriel caught me. There was another blinding flash. I found myself alone, standing on the pavement of a strange city. There was a red phone booth on the corner and pigeons flying overhead. The cars driving past were all doing so on the left. Somewhere in England, I thought. Then I heard a scream followed by a deafening roar. The harmonics were unmistakable; it was the roar of a jaguar. I took off at a dead run, fumbling out the revolver I'd taken off that poor cop months ago. I skidded around a corner and found myself on a crowded thoroughfare. The jaguar crouched at one end and a river of people was pouring in the other direction, knocking over food stalls and the tables of sidewalk cafés as they ran. Two cars had collided in their effort to avoid the beast. It bounded over them with a contemptuous grace and drew back one massive paw to strike down the man nearest to it. I screamed defiance and unloaded the revolver at the monster. The bullets thudded into it without obvious effect, but it distracted the beast long enough for the man to escape. I advanced as he fled, pushing at the jaguar's mind, keeping its attention focused on me. Its muscles bunched, preparing to spring and I drew my obsidian dagger. It hadn't done Jasper any good back in the minefield but it was better than nothing. I gripped my trusty bread knife in my other hand and planted my feet in the middle of the road, ready to go down fighting. The jaguar leapt. My eyes followed the motion as its heavy body arced towards me and came...pattering gently down. I blinked. Where a moment before there had been thousands of pounds of angry jaguar, now there was just a gentle rain of ash. Thick grey flakes settled on my hair and shoulders like snow. And then the sun came out. The shadow that had lain across the sky melted into purple and then rose and then gold. I blinked my eyes at the warm glow and found that I was blinking away tears. I looked around and realized that everyone in that crowded street was staring at me, as though they couldn't quite decide whether to applaud or call for the police. Someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned. It was Ezriel. "I'm to return you to Arcadia at once," the angel said. "Tom is very angry with me." "He's not the only one," I growled and stuck out my hand. Ezriel took it and we vanished. We reappeared on the steps before the portal. The mirror's surface had gone milky white and every place I looked, I saw hunters standing or sitting as if struck dumb. Every place but one. Tom stood in front of Elliot, his flaming sword drawn, one arm flung out to keep them back. Rollo advanced on them slowly, half slithering and half stalking, his forked tongue flicking out between those scimitar fangs, questing towards Elliot's familiar scent. His talons slid in and out of their sheathes, gouging the stone beneath his feet, and his mane writhed as though whipped by a gale. His green eyes burned into Tom's and there was murder in them. I stared at them, my two stupid and courageous protectors, about to tear each other to bloody shreds, and I thought: ''No. ''Unbidden, an image rose to the forefront of my memory. My father, sprawled on the kitchen floor, red welts rising on his face and hands where Rollo's tentacles had lashed him. ''No, not again. '' "Not again!" I didn't realize I'd screamed the words aloud until they turned to look at me. Rollo's emerald eyes found mine and I opened to him. I'd never done that before. Not even when I called to him. Not even when Luiz told me what he was. Always, always, I'd been trying to push him away, to shut him out, to make him something that wasn't me. Now, I opened. I opened my eyes and my mind and my Sight as wide as they would go, and Rollo came rushing in. I breathed him in like a dark wind, drank him like a black wine. I let him fill up the empty places in my heart. "Welcome home," I whispered. My knees gave way and I flung out a hand to break my fall. My vision blurred and for a moment I saw long talons on the ends of my fingers, black scales on the back of my hand. Then Elliot was with me. They had their arms around me and were rocking me gently back and forth, back and forth. After a moment, I was able to stand again. I didn't though. Not right away. It's hours later now and I've left Elliot and Tom back at the bunker, sleeping peacefully. Or not. Whatever. If two people have ever earned some time alone together, it's those two. And me? I'm sitting in the bushes at the edge of a clearing, in Moscow, Idaho. I asked Ezriel to bring me here. There's a white house in the clearing. In the house live a husband and wife and their two sons, twins. The twins will have turned, gosh, eleven only a few weeks ago. The twins have a big sister. She used to live in the house too. Perhaps she will again. Or perhaps she'll live in a bunker under North Dakota, or somewhere else altogether. I haven't decided yet. But it is my decision now. I'm free. And there's a whisper at the back of my mind that keeps saying, "Welcome home."